The present invention relates to computer telephony. More specifically, the present invention relates to computer network-based telecommunication systems and servers.
Offices today share many modern conveniences, such as fax machines, electronic mail, commonly known as e-mail, high-powered computers, voice mail, and the like. Offices also share many of the same inconveniences, such as jammed copy machines, broken computers, and even disheveled piles of paper having scribbled telephone numbers. Often, just who the telephone number actually calls has long been forgotten, but typically the scraps are not thrown away, “just in case” the numbers are still needed.
These scraps of papers are commonly a byproduct of voice mail systems. In particular, when users retrieve their voice mail messages, the caller leaves a message and a number they can be reached at, also known as a call-back number. So the user can return the call, she typically scribbles the call-back number on an envelope, an unrelated piece of paper, a sticky pad, and the like. Later, when convenient, the user can return the caller's call. As noted above, when the user has a great number of messages to return, these scraps of paper can get shuffled around and even lost. As a result, the user may not be able to return the message. Even if the user can find the number, she must dial it over and over, if there is no answer.
One of the recent solutions to reduce the need for voice mail users to write down call-back numbers left in their mail boxes has been use of user or caller call-back technology. One of the pioneering companies in the area of call-back technology has been AltiGen Communications, the assignee of the present invention. With call-back functionality, the caller is prompted to enter her call-back number by way of pressing keys on her telephone keypad, which in turn generates well known DTMF tones. These DTMF tones are then recorded into the voice mail system. Later when the owner of the mail box reviews the message, she can direct the voice mail system to dial the same DTMF tones to return the caller's message.
Drawbacks to having callers leave call-back telephone numbers include that it required the caller to enter their call-back telephone number in a manner different from the way the caller would leave a message. For example, the caller would leave a voice message, and then enter a call-back telephone number with a numeric keypad. This way of providing call-back service was potentially dangerous for the caller, for example, if the caller were driving on crowded expressway. In such a case, the caller would have to first fumble for the telephone, take her eyes off traffic to make sure the phone was in the proper position, and while looking at the telephone keypad press a series of keys.
In a concept pioneered by AltiGen communications, principles of computer telephony are now being adapted for telecommunications systems utilizing computer networks for transmission of data. However, the concept of a call-back telephone numbers applied to computer network-based calls has not heretofore been envisioned or implemented. Potential obstacles become apparent when attempting to apply telephone number call-back capture techniques to computer network-based communications. For example, potential drawbacks include that users' typically have no idea what their computer network address are, e.g. IP address, DNS addresses, and the like; or even how to specify computer-network call-back data characters with just a telephone keypad; and the like. Other such drawbacks can be envisioned.
Thus, in light of the above, what is needed in the industry are methods and apparatus for providing computer-network call-back data for computer network-based telephony.